Have you ever wondered what drives an individual to start a skin care business?

Let's examine the facts.

There are countless skin care brands out there. Many, many high quality, interesting brands already exist. Many brands are already featuring natural and organic ingredients. Many brands are also lovingly made my artisans who are not very different than me.

Why start this kind of business when there is so much competition?
Does the world really need another bottle of lotion/butter/moisturizer/serum?

I've been working on creating skin care products through Astrida Naturals for nearly 7 years now. While my passion for continuing in skin care is driven by my positive obsession to build something there are many reasons why I started going down the skin care road in the first place.

Over the next few days I'll discuss the various reasons why I started Astrida Naturals.

Part 1: I started Astrida Naturals to modernize unrefined shea butter.

The seeds of Astrida Naturals began in Azizi Books.

Azizi Books was the independent, African American themed bookstore my father and I pioneered after finishing our MBA's together (yes, I am a bit of a daddy's girl).

Our whole business was based on bringing more African culture to our local neighborhood. We curated an intense selection of African American interest book titles, accessories and gifts. Eventually the idea to sell West African Unrefined Shea Butter came up.

We found a few suppliers but I wasn't too excited about the presentation. You see, I'm a designer, a highly visual person who cares very much about the look of things in my house. When we were opening Azizi Books I obsessed over the aesthetics of everything from product displays to how the receipts printed out. It's all in the details right? So when I looked up shea butter suppliers I was less than thrilled about the aesthetics and packaging presentation.

Aesthetics became one of the reasons I started Astrida Naturals.

Products featuring natural, unrefined shea butter seemed so 'unrefined' when it came to design. Not bad, but also not polished, too busy and not a reflection of what I wanted when choosing skin care. Why not repackage shea butter in a more attractive package. I could do it. I put my design skills to use to modernize shea butter product presentation.

Join me tomorrow for Part 2 of this post and more info on why I started Astrida Naturals